Friday, May 30, 2008

COMMENTS: The Dodgers are of to a rollicking start to this roadtrip, now 0-4 with three games to go. In the past four games we've witnessed impotent offense (particularly with RISP), blown saves by both of our bulwarks (Jonathan Broxton and Takashi Saito), and runners thrown out at home (Juan Pierre, yesterday in the first inning). Despite daily shuffling of the cards, the nine spots in the lineup aren't enough to hide the warning-track power of Jeff Kent, the three-pitch strikeouts from Matt Kemp, the average-plummeting slump of James Loney, or the sub-Mendoza numbers from Chin-Lung Hu. And that's not even counting the worthless spot reserved for Mark "Black Hole" Sweeney, the worst pinch-hitter slot in the majors, let alone the DL spot occupied by Andruw Jones. With Rafael Furcal still unavailable, this comedy of errors is enough to raise the (presidential campaign-paraphrasing) question: are we better off now (under Joe Torre) than we were with Grady Little? I shudder at the thought.

But don't blame the Sons of Steve Garvey, as we are once again pulling out all the stops, putting SoSG's own Eric Karros on a plane to get out to Shea this evening and root on our intrepid Dodger squad. Look for the dashing man with Dodgers body paint swimming around in 50% humidity. (Oh yeah, and EK can't bend at the knees, so don't ask him to pick up the card you want him to autograph off the ground.)

Torre: Hey Kershaw, come on in my office, I want to talk to you about tonight.

Kershaw: Yeah, coach.

Torre: Well, you know this is an important game. So I picked a lineup especially for you! (Shows him the lineup card). See how much offense we are going to generate! Aren't you excited? We have TWO rookie infielders and TWO sophomore players. You have great veteran leadership in Pierre too. So go get 'em buddy. We will spot you one run the entire night. Just go out there and pitch a shutout and you just might win.

Whoever is doing the Mets' broadcast (Keith Hernandez?) tells us something unique about John Maine: he's better when he throws balls at the knees and at the letters, but suffers when he throws them at the belt. What amazing insight.

Something tells me Elias could tell me some stats about how most pitchers fare when they throw the ball to a hitter at the belt.

Someone must have told Kershaw to trust his defense. Castro just hit a bouncer over Kershaw's head, much like the ball Reyes hit in the first. Kershaw thought about jumping up, but stopped, and Maza was able to make the play.

I walked past the Park Hyatt the other day, and it did look nice. My hotel is nice, one block off of Michigan on Ontario. It's called The James. Even nicer still is that I don't have to pay for it. I stayed at The James in Scottsdale, and they can be pretty pricey. I would say it's very much like a W, actually.

Wish I'd have known one of the Sons was at Shea - I was there as well (picture from my seats up on my blog momentarily). Would have been nice to meet up and help me torment the poor Mets fans, especially when Aaron Heilman arrived.